Books

KP has also written both fiction and non-fiction.

A huge baseball fan, KP wrote “Don’t Blame the Knuckleballer! Baseball Legends, Myths, and Stories” in 2015, a book that looks at more than 30 obscure and forgotten tales told by ballplayers, coaches, and broadcasters throughout baseball history – and repeated by historians and bloggers – while mixing in a knuckleballing theme. For each tale, KP asks, “Did this really happen?” or “Did they blame the right person?” Among the tales:

* Did Joe Niekro really strike out the first five batters of a game in the very first inning?

* Did Phil Niekro really make Floyd Robinson silly on a strikeout?

* Did “Sunday Teddy” Lyons really pitch only on Sundays?

* How did Tom Candiotti “botch” the Jeff Kent fantasy baseball story?

* Did Pedro Martinez actually forget the details of his first big-league start and blame the wrong guy?

* Did you know that Ted Williams had to face a knuckleballer on the next-to-last day of his historic 1941 season?

* Was Mark Grace really on deck when Glenallen Hill hit his mammoth home run at Wrigley?

In 2015, KP’s hockey book, “The End of the Montreal Jinx: Boston’s Short-Lived Glory in the Historic Bruins-Canadiens Rivalry (1988-1994),” looks at the oft-forgotten era of Boston Bruins hockey where the B’s finally triumphed over Montreal in playoff competition. This book can be purchased here.

In 2014, KP’s baseball book, “Tom Candiotti: A Life of Knuckleballs,” was published by McFarland and Company. The biography of the former major-league knuckleball pitcher can be purchased here.

The website for “Tom Candiotti: A Life of Knuckleballs” can be found here.

“Fess Up, Jessup!” was published by Bucks County Publishing (PA) in 2010, a book which includes three short thriller stories penned by KP.

“Fess Up, Jessup!” can be purchased here. A review of this book can be found here.

“Oh So Close, Canada! Lamenting Some of the Missed Championships in Canadian Sports History,” published on Lulu.com in 2009, looks at some of the missed championships by Canadian teams over the past 30 years. KP covers some hard-luck teams from that era, including the 1994 Montreal Expos, 2002 Toronto Maple Leafs, 2004 Calgary Flames, and the Calgary Stampeders of the 1990s. This book can be purchased here.